Information technology has evolved from a highly centralized and provider-driven model towards a more decentralized model, which promotes user empowerment, innovation and personalization. The telecommunications industry makes use of a very hierarchical model of device networking, which governs positioning and roles for the entire system, roughly the analogue of centralized mainframe computing before the advent of the microcomputer. In such a system the end-user sitting at the edge of this network has little or no influence or control on how services they require are delivered to them.